1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a lead bending machine for electronic components that is capable of bending leads of electronic components without straining the electronic components by causing the leads to move along a circular arc. More particularly, the present invention relates to a lead bending machine for electronic components that is capable of dealing with a great variety of electronic components varying in shape from each other.
2. Description of the Background Art
In general, bending of leads of electronic components, e.g. LSIs, is carried out by press working, and there have been cases where excessive force applied to an LSI package or gold wire for bonding may cause damage to these portions. Accordingly, the present inventor proposed an apparatus wherein the leads of electronic components are bent by causing the leads to move along a circular arc using a bender comprising a movable punch and a movable die as in Japanese Patent Application Post-Examination Publication No. 7-95576.
The conventional apparatus that uses a bender as in Japanese Patent Application Post-Examination Publication No. 7-95576 suffers from the problem that because there are a great variety of electronic components varying in the shape, length and bend dimensions of leads, it is necessary to use a special-purpose bender for each type of electronic components. Therefore, a large number of different types of benders are needed, and an increase in the cost of benders causes the working cost to increase. Moreover, the conventional apparatus has the disadvantage that it takes a great deal of time to cope with the demand for bending the leads of a new type of electronic components because the production of a bender takes a long time. In addition, during the actual working operation, it takes a great deal of time and labor to change benders according to the type of electronic components, and this causes the working efficiency to decrease.